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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25383292">little beast</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/perennials/pseuds/perennials'>perennials</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Haikyuu!!</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Gen, Good Bye, manga spoilers to the end, op is devastated, op is going to fight god, op's tear streaked 3 hour ode to hinata shouyou</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 11:28:06</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,194</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25383292</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/perennials/pseuds/perennials</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>YOU ARE, AND ALWAYS WILL BE, SMALL.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>142</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>894</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>little beast</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>FUCK!!!!!!!!!!!! ITS OVER</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>Haikyuu, also known as volleyball. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>02.20.2012 - 07.20.2020</em>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>After losing to Karasuno at the Interhigh qualifiers, Ikejiri Hayato cries his eyes out. He had wanted to stay on that court for the next match, and the one after, even though Tokonami has never been a high-flyer. He had wanted to play more volleyball. But they’re marsh people, him and his team. They’re low-rise apartments and old houses with two floors and a garden out back, and Karasuno is full of winged miracles. Still, he had hoped for a next chapter, from some unnameable place in his heart. That hope had brought him here. He wipes his eyes on the sleeve of his shirt, and splashes his face with water. His reflection is blurry and wet. Never mind that the story of high school volleyball ends here for him. Never mind the bitterness of defeat. Nothing is over yet.</p><p>After losing to Karasuno at the Interhigh qualifiers, Aone Takanobu shakes Hinata Shouyou’s hand. He’s upset that they lost, in the way that one might feel sad that a bird they have nursed back to health flies away in the night. He watches Karasuno walk off the court, into the light, until Futakuchi pokes him in the back and jerks his chin in the direction of their bench. Get going, he means. Get a move on, I know how you feel, I’m feeling it too, though I’m probably more bitter than you, because I’m cool like that. So Takanobu follows Futakuchi and the rest out. After having stood in the gymnasium all morning, with its vaulted ceiling and big white spotlights, the ceiling outside feels too low. He hunches his shoulders and stoops a little, though he knows he doesn’t have to, that he’ll never hit anything. Height never meant you were invincible. He knows this now, and he doesn’t mourn it. He stares it in the eye, and waits for it to blink. At the end of the day, he had wanted to play more volleyball. But he will have more chances to after this, extending like a string of Christmas lights into the next year. Datekou’s legacy will not end here. The ceiling will fall away to reveal the cracked surface of the sky, and they will unfurl their spines, and then they will try again.</p><p>After losing to Seijou at the Interhigh qualifiers, Kageyama Tobio curses the name Oikawa Tooru with all the spite he can muster. Then he curses himself. Before he can move further down the list of people to curse, so as to distract from the immediate, burning sting of loss, he is being herded into a restaurant, and he is sitting down, and someone is putting a bowl of rice in front of him. Coach Ukai tells them to eat. At first Tobio is indignant. He isn’t done cursing anyone at all. He is going to raise hell in his head, because no one ever taught him how to deal with disappointment, only how to make it someone else’s business. But the food is good. He takes a piece of meat, then another, then another, and then he cries his eyes out, and losing sucks, especially when it’s to Oikawa Tooru, but he’ll have to get over it eventually. So why not start now? Tomorrow, they’ll review the choices they made today that led them back home, on a big screen with a small heart. They will brush the dirt off their knees. They will keep going.</p><p>After losing to Shiratorizawa at the Interhigh qualifiers, Oikawa Tooru makes a voodoo doll of Ushijima Wakatoshi and then rips its heart out. He doesn’t actually do that, of course, but he’s certainly thinking about it when he bumps into Ushijima outside the gymnasium, later on in the day. Ushijima tells him he should have come to Shiratorizawa. Tooru thinks that Ushijima should suck a dick. But out loud, this is what he says: don’t you ever forget this worthless pride of mine. Don’t you forget, Ushijima stupidly-powerful-left-handed-basketball-brained Wakatoshi. I will come back, and I will Beyblade fight you. I will make you take back every word you’ve ever said against my team.</p><p>After losing to Karasuno at the Spring High qualifiers, Terushima Yuuji wants ice cream. He’s trying not to think about the fact that they played so hard, they lost control of the play, though he knows that’s what happened. Yuuji has a decent amount of faith in himself. He has cool hair, a cool personality, and cool piercings. He doesn’t mess up that often, though when he does, it’s always a sizable disaster. He wonders if this counts as a disaster as he performs the losing clown’s walk off the court. The rest of his team is still processing the unexpected loss. But what loss is expected? What’s the point of going into things bracing for failure? Terushima Yuuji is too cool for that, though he’ll admit he’s jealous of Karasuno’s shrimpy number ten, just for having that look in his eyes. Whatever. Shit happens, cool people lose, cool people make things explode. He’ll try again tomorrow, just because he can, just for the hell of it. He’ll try everything.</p><p>After losing to Karasuno at the Spring High qualifiers, Nakashima Takeru wants to apologize to his family, who has come to cheer him on, but they throw their megaphones and their noisemakers aside and jump him before he can do so. Ah, he thinks, through the tunnel of frustration and disappointment. I am loved. Then he wants to apologize again, this time to his team, for being dramatic and weird and a failure all at once, but his team tries to jump him, too. He dodges. In the distance, Karasuno is doing a little celebratory routine which involves them all yelling at each other. The orange-haired shrimp looks like he can’t believe he’s made it this far, and yet he clearly wants to. The air is literally burning with want. They’ve all got dreams; that’s what put them here, after all. They all want to reach the top, but the question is, the top of what? Where does desire end, and where does self-reflection begin? How can you proceed with the knowledge that you may not end up where you want to be? Takeru hiccups a laugh. To hell with clairvoyance. They’re in it for the long-haul. They’re in life to succeed.</p><p>After losing to Karasuno at the Spring High qualifier semi-finals, Oikawa Tooru makes a voodoo doll of himself and then sets it on fire. Of course, he doesn’t actually do that, but he thinks about it hard enough that Iwa-chan gives him an extra-tough Iwa-chan Glare immediately after the thought crosses his mind, because Iwa-chan is a telepathic alien from outer space. Shut the fuck up, he means. I know how you feel. I know how you fucking feel, Oikawa bitchass Tooru. Oikawa bitchass Tooru watches Tobio-chan and the orange shrimp bounce off the court, like a pair of volleyballs thrown from someone’s fifth-floor window, and plans his comeback. Naturally, it‘ll be dramatic as hell. There’ll be a big swathe of sky, and a volleyball net, and maybe some sand. A whole stretch of sand. A beach. Oikawa Tooru isn’t really going anywhere, even if high school volleyball is over for him. Because guess what happens after high school? That’s right. Life. Life happens. Miracles happen. Oikawa Tooru is going to happen.</p><p>After losing to Karasuno at the Spring High qualifier finals in Miyagi, Ushijima Wakatoshi wipes his face on the inside of his jersey, cringes at the unpleasantness of the sensation, and goes for a towel. He had wanted to play more volleyball, as all volleyball players do. He had been looking forward to the Spring High. Regardless, they still have jump serve practice to do, once the bus deposits them back at school. His teammates will expect him to say something, so he will have to find words that successfully encapsulate the wordless, limitless determination that constitutes Ushijima Wakatoshi. Coach Washijou spends a long time looking off in Karasuno’s direction, long after they’ve left the gymnasium. He has had a revelation today. On the other hand, Wakatoshi has always known that height is not the key to immortality. That is why he has always worked so hard, and will continue to do so, as he moves out of high school and towards the broad horizon of the world. He salutes the first-year freak combo in his mind, but also the unshakeable third-year captain, the unstoppable vice-captain, the angry monk-head, the libero. The libero. The libero is someone to be feared. They will all go far. But Wakatoshi will go farther.</p><p>After losing to Karasuno on the first day of the Spring High, Himekawa Aoi cries his eyes out. It’s cliche, he knows. There’s far less for him to cry about than his seniors, who won’t be able to keep playing high school volleyball the way he will, even after they’ve gone back to school. But he’s sad. He’s so sad. He had hit his ceiling serve, and it had dazzled everyone in the stadium, and then they had lost. In spite of everything, they won’t be spending another night in Tokyo, though he wants it more than death. What did Karasuno do right? He squints at them through puffy, red eyes. Karasuno has first-years on the starting lineup. Karasuno has small giants with clumsy feet. But Karasuno will be staying for another match, and Aoi will not. Echigo-san claps him on the back, and a fresh wave of tears wells up. Oh, he thinks glumly, how loss hurts. How it stays with you like the words of an old friend you hope to never speak to again, as you push yourself off the ground with the palms of your hands, and you try again.</p><p>After losing to Karasuno on the first day of the Spring High, Kita Shinsuke nods at himself. He nods at every member of his team, who have all outdone themselves despite the results that firmly say otherwise. The twins are crying, as expected. A lot of people are crying, which Shinsuke thinks is nice, which tells him that he had been the captain of a team that cared enough to feel hurt. Loss hurts. Watching Karasuno move forward, while the greatest challengers remain rooted in the sand, Shinsuke wonders how many teams have seen their backs disappear into the distance now. Did they expect it? Did they think it would happen? What little is known about Karasuno amounts to nothing. In spite of that lack of expectation, of attention, of revelation, they are headed for a solitary tomorrow. Shinsuke tells Inarizaki he’s proud to have had them as his teammates, and that he wishes he could have played with them longer. The twins cry again. Everything stays the same even as everything keeps changing around him, so he makes plans for the weekend, and he thinks about the future, and he smiles, just a little, to himself.</p><p>After losing to Karasuno on the third day of the Spring High, Kenma wants to sleep forever. He literally wants to sleep forever. He can barely feel his bones, or his teeth, which he supposes are also bones, and his back hurts like hell. But he meant what he said to Shouyou, and he still means it. Volleyball is fun. Volleyball can be fun. His world is a little bigger, now that he knows this. Kuro looks like he’s just watched his baby bird leave the nest, and it makes Kenma want to whack him or maybe tentatively pat him on the back. But frankly speaking, it’s all too much effort for him right now, so he doesn’t do that. Instead, he watches Shouyou run off the court, always just his back, always the big bright number on his jersey. He watches Shouyou leave the world frothing in his wake, and hopes for clear skies.</p><p><br/>
::</p><p><br/>
“Hinata-kun, right now, this very moment— <em>this is still volleyball.”</em></p><p><br/>
::</p><p><br/>
Karasuno player substitution<br/>
In:  No. 8, Narita (MB)<br/>
Out:  No. 10, Hinata (MB)<br/>
<br/>
</p><p>::</p><p><br/>
After losing his wallet, Shouyou’s just a little miserable. He’s tired, he’s hungry, and he’s alone. Rio is absolutely dazzling, all sand and sky and water, but for the briefest of moments, it feels like he’s walking through a wormhole.</p><p>When he sees Oikawa Tooru, he doesn’t think about the fact that he may have very well made a voodoo doll of him in his last year of high school and ripped its heart out. Instead, he’s thinking about how there are only that many places in the world a volleyball player can go, and that they both happened to wind up here. He teaches Oikawa about beach volleyball. About your feet in the sand, and the sand in your hair, and the way the wind blows hard enough to send a volleyball careening into your face. Oikawa absorbs it all like a sponge with a dimensional portal hidden inside, and then makes shitty set after shitty set after shitty, butt-awful set, until,</p><p>“NICE KILL, SHOUYOU.”</p><p>Shouyou jumps for the high-five.</p><p>“NICE SET AS WELL, OIKAWA-SAN.”</p><p>They have dinner at one of the beachside restaurants with big booths for seating big groups, and big platters of food for big people who play volleyball. Oikawa looks less ready to set a voodoo doll on fire, now that they’re not standing on opposite sides of a net. He looks great, actually. Oikawa is playing in the Argentinian league. Shouyou thinks that’s really cool. Shouyou wonders how cool he will be the next time they meet, as he tells Oikawa about how much he misses convenience stores and Oikawa describes his specific, debilitating craving for bubble tea. Will he have cut his hair again by then? Will he be wearing that same old expression, of hunger and bitterness and hunger? Oikawa said he had remembered that volleyball is fun because of Shouyou. Shouyou wonders if Oikawa is secretly Kenma.</p><p>They shake hands on their meeting, a week later. Oikawa is going back to Argentina, and Shouyou is staying in Brazil. It’s been the best first week he’s had in ages, and he laughs as he promises Oikawa he’ll treat him to bubble tea if they both wind up back in Japan someday. Oikawa smiles like he’s going to kill someone. Oikawa probably has Beyblades hidden in his really cool backpack. But he doesn’t kill anyone, and he doesn’t take out his Beyblades. He just says ‘I’m going to beat everyone’ and adds on, as an afterthought, that that includes Shouyou as well. Shouyou tilts his head back up to the sky and inhales. He inhales salt and sea and sand, the smell of Rio, the smell of sunshine. He can’t wait to be back in Japan, to walk into convenience stores and gawk at the cold drinks section. But right now, he’s here, and he’ll be damned if he doesn’t make the best of it. All things in preparation for the future. All futures aimed at the sun.</p><p>After winning against the Schweiden Adlers, Shouyou gets thrown in the air by Atsumu, who should frankly not be throwing anyone in the air but does not care enough to be wary. Atsumu is a walking safety hazard, so it’s a good thing he likes Shouyou. If not, he’d be dead by now. Atsumu catches him when he falls back down with the help of Bokuto, who was there all along, and Adriah, who looks scared to death for all three of them. It’s a wonderful day to play against the first guy that pissed you off on a volleyball court. It’s a wonderful day to win. But Shouyou wants to try again, and see if he’ll win again; Shouyou wants to keep playing volleyball. He’s already thinking about practice, and practice matches, and the rest of the season, even as Yachi and Tsukishima and Yamaguchi rush down to meet him. There are eyes on him in the bleachers. He is someone to look out for now. A name with a face, a monster at the banquet. He’s happy. He’s so happy.</p><p>Later, he will go back to Brazil. Later, he will come back to play on Japan’s national team. Much, much later, he will wind up at the Olympics, standing beside Yaku from Nekoma, and Hakuba from Kamomedai, because your high school selves never really leave you no matter how far you go, and you will always remember feeling fifteen. He will stand on the court beside Kageyama Tobio from Karasuno, while Oikawa Tooru makes eyes at him from across the net. He will stand in a court full of monsters, and he will feel like one of them.</p><p>An ocean away, an elementary schooler on a bike will pass by a storefront television set, and they will stop, for a moment, to stare. On the screen, a boy jumps for the ball. He is barely five foot six, standing on a court full of giants who loom over his head.They’re playing a game called volleyball. In spite of all that, in spite of all the ways the universe has conspired to keep him in his metal cage, the boy jumps. The boy jumps, and it’s like watching a sunflower sprout from the concrete. You would have never expected it to be possible, but now that it has happened, the laws of the universe have been rewritten. The sun is a star, and the boy is a god. You are falling in love with volleyball.</p><p>That elementary school kid is Hinata Shouyou. That kid is the Little Giant. That kid is you, reading about boys who play volleyball, who lose at volleyball, and who pick themselves off the ground with bruised hands and bruised knees in spite of the howling of the world all around them, over and over again, because they love this sport enough to die for it. This is a manga about volleyball. But this is also a manga about losers. This is a life.</p><p>And you swear, you've known this boy since forever. You watched him grow up through the slow toll of the years; you grew up with him. You cringed, and you sighed, and you waited for each Sunday like a child sitting at the foot of a Christmas tree, their eyes wide, their hearts hammering. Which is why you know that Hinata Shouyou will keep on playing volleyball, on a beach in Rio, on a storefront television set in Miyagi, on the great, shining courts of the world. No matter how convoluted the road, no matter how miserable the afternoon, no matter how hopeless and fucked-up and awful the state of everything in the present-day universe may be, he will keep on playing volleyball. He will lose, as they have all lost, and it will hurt like hell. He will laugh at himself. He will keep going.</p><p>So you get back on your bike, and you blink the stars out of your eyes, and you keep on pedaling down that old dirt road, towards the bright and uncertain future.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>talk to me on <a href="https://twitter.com/nikiforcvs">twitter</a> or <a href="http://corpsentry.tumblr.com/">tumblr</a></p><p>I DECIDED TO WRITE THIS SIX HOURS BEFORE CHAPTER 402 WAS GOING TO COME OUT WHILE HANGING UPSIDE DOWN FROM THE SOFA IN MY LIVING ROOM AND LISTENING TO RELAXING ANIME BG MUSIC (2 HOURS) SO SUFFICE TO SAY THIS IS AN ABSOLUTE CLUSTERFUCK BUT IN THE TRADITION OF JUNE SHOOTING STAR EMOJI HAIKYUU IS ENDING AND I AM SAD AS FUCK SO HERE YOU GO SOME WORDS ABOUT HOW FUCKING SAD I AM. ANYWAY THANKS FOR READING AND I HOPE YOU HAD FUN, I WOULD LOVE TO HEAR FROM YOU BUT YOUR IKEA CLOSET IS GOOD TOO. HAIKYUU MAY BE OVER BUT WE WILL LIVE ON FOREVER, LIKE GODS OR OIKAWA TOORU OR MOST LIKELY BOTH. TAKE CARE, I LOVE YOU.<br/>(edit: LITTLE BEAST IS A REFERENCE TO LITTLE BEAST BY RICHARD SIKEN. RETELLING THE STORY THROUGH THE EYES OF THE LOSERS WAS MY WAY OF SAYING HAIKYUU IS A STORY ABOUT LOSING BUT ALSO NOT REALLY ALSO I HAD JUST DIED FIGHTING ASGORE FROM UNDERTALE FIVE TIMES IN A ROW SO MY BRAIN WAS SHOT)</p><p>HAVE A GOOD ONE</p></blockquote></div></div>
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